


forfeiter

by infinitefuriosa (alternategalaxy)



Category: Darker Than Black
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2017-01-26
Packaged: 2018-08-08 21:51:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7775014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alternategalaxy/pseuds/infinitefuriosa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's placed in an interrogation room. Like so many years before a PANDORA scientist (because nothing will stop the behemoth that is PANDORA) gently probes with questions. Li does not speak.<br/>At one point, he looks up, and his eyes – blacker than anything Misaki has ever seen – cut right through the glass wall and into her core. It is an image that stares at her when she excuses herself to find a vending machine, and buys something just to ground herself to this world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

After the events of Hell's Gate, Misaki finds herself holding the fort. The higher-ups drag their feet in the search for a new section chief – they say that she is suited, but she does not want to be confined to a desk. She does not have the finesse for politics, especially in the wake of the syndicate going deeper underground (no one can think it's gone, systems of control cannot just disappear like that, and sometimes she's annoyed because _better the devil be known_ ).

But, flipside: in lieu of somewhere to send it, the data from astronomics about star activity arrives on her desk daily. She always, always checks BK201, because Li is gone, but his star has not fallen, and she still has so many questions. It spends most time inactive, the rare spike. It's practically normal, for him.

And then one day: a phonecall from the labs. The designation echoes down the phoneline, coldness seeps down her spine.

_Forfeiter_.

Misaki hauls ass to the lab, does not sleep for two days, and in the end just has a lot of questions. What has happened? 

A week after this, there is a new call – target located. Misaki cannot take part in the tac-team to bring him in, but she is there to receive the prison van. The man they capture is him, her heart clenches, but he is _hollow_ . She is reminded so strongly of Carmine, and the events then, and her heart breaks a little bit. Because Li was a liar, he was a _facade_ , and the man who used a scary voice with rice on his face was a ruse all along, and some times she's so angry about that she wants to shake him. 

If she could find him. 

But this man …

He's placed in an interrogation room. Like so many years before a PANDORA scientist (because nothing will stop the behemoth that is _PANDORA_ ) gently probes with questions. Li does not speak.

At one point, he looks up, and his eyes – blacker than anything Misaki has _ever_ seen – cut right through the glass wall and into her _core_. It is an image that stares at her when she excuses herself to find a vending machine, and buys something just to ground herself to this world. 

Out there in the hall, a small Indian woman approaches Misaki. There is a soft desperation around the woman, and Misaki is reminded of all a confidential informant, sneaking out the back of a yakuza club to risk life and limb for the chance to get _out_.

 It's a brief conversation, coded heavily. Misaki is wary, always so wary, and this woman _wants_ to trust but knows better than to not. Misaki wouldn't trust Section 4 either, so she can't say she's all that resentful of it.

 They meet again a few hours later, when Li – Hei – has been transferred to a holding cell, one with a rubber floor and four guards on the door. Mina slides into a chair opposite Misaki in the Astronomic's cafeteria, and gently pushes a paper across the table. It's a dossier of BK201's activity over the last month, but Misaki barely needs to look at it. She remembers these details, and had stared at a page much like this all afternoon.

  _Forfeiter._

 It's the extent of Mina's information, though it sounds like she has a theory on the tip of her tongue. Misaki nudges her glasses higher on her nose, levels a look at Mina, and says quietly, _what do you think happened_.

 The conversation flows after that, the women tossing theories over cold coffee, wondering if it's something he's done to himself, something that was done to him. The medical details indicate he's fit and healthy – but so are Dolls, in their own way, so that doesn't say much of anything. Konou and Saito both ring, it's Matsumoto whose call she answers. They don't have any new information – just want to make sure she's alright, maybe acquire some details themselves. It's then that Misaki realises she's barely said two words to her own department since BK201 landed, and it puts the speculative conversation to an end.

 She warns Mina, gently, _don't try and save him._ Li was a friend but the Black Reaper has history, and crime must be paid for. That is the justice system she believes in. 

Funny. She should have said it to herself. 

Her phone goes off again three quarters of the way home. A second later Misaki feels the rumble under her car of shaking ground, and knows without anyone in the car to tell her. _Explosions_. She flicks the siren, floors the accelerator to spin the car back around, blares through traffic ahead of the jam that's about to happen. 

HQ's been hit. Someone wants the Reaper. Shit. They hadn't been careful enough.

Or – they hadn't valued BK201 enough? 

Running into a bombed building is not high on Misaki's moments of wise decisions, but it's not one she'd take back for all the world. Her phone is a constant buzz against her thigh as she runs, gun out and carefully to the side, adrenaline coursing through her as she navigates smoked out halls and fleeing staff. There's been a systematic assault, here – whoever wants the Reaper, wants him at a cost far greater than they wanted Carmine. 

They've got a leak in the department for sure. But only half a dozen people knew where BK201 was being held, and four of them were guards. It was a quiet bit of paranoid instinct, but one that's paid off. 

Or so she thinks. She swings into a hall that was meant to be dimissed, passed over, and the walls are pockmarked with bulletholes. Three guards are dead on the floor. The cell door is open. 

The fourth guard is inside the cell – who, why? That was against orders – and he hits the floor as she crests the doorframe. Li is standing over him, impassive in the face of death. 

She remembers the rumour that the Reaper existed in South America before becoming a contractor, and finds it confirmed in the spill of blood across Li's feet. Her arms snap up, levelling her regulation firearm at him. “Don't move.” 

Misaki sucks in a breath when those black eyes land on her, and the lines in his gaunt face soften just a fraction. 

“He was a mole.” 

It's the most he's said since arriving. 

The _rat-tat-tat_ of approaching gunfire is enough to ensure there isn't any more. He slides to attention, and she wonders if he _feels_ , rather than sees, the approaching enemy. The tactical backup for this guard's supposedly successful abduction. Misaki has to decide, fast, if they run or they fight, because there aren't a lot of options here – and she can't shake the feeling that if Li tries to fight, he'll die. 

She wants a lot of things, but his death isn't one of them. 

She drops the gun – Li doesn't notice – and steps back, out of the room. “This way.” 

There's a long moment where she has to wait, the gunfire drawing closer in this long moment of indecision. Li's mouth tightens, and in the end he follows. Misaki leads them through back doors and stairwells, alarms blaring at them, fire exit doors blocking every piece of momentum they build, until they get to the underground carpark. It's not her first choice – that would be the car she slung into a free space between two tactical units on the street outside. 

She throws a mental apology to Saito when it's his car they hijack instead. Li's palm is against the door – to try and brute-force the system, she realises – when a dark look passes over him. _Forfeiter._

“I have a key,” she tells him, and in two minutes they're on the road, getting out of there – getting somewhere safe – and she's got a sulky, silent copilot. 

 

The smoking HQ building disappears behind taller buildings and worsening traffic, and her phone's gone silent but the roar of noise in her head is still there. Are they being followed? Shit. What does she do if they are? Drive back towards HQ, hope they get intercepted? Do they go to PANDORA? 

Li's quiet command cuts across the storm. “Go slower. Take the next left,” he says, and before she realises it, her foot is easing off the pedal. Saito's car is heavier, broader, and it's really only the tint on the windows that belies its role as a government vehicle. It curls around the turn. “Where are we going?”

Li says nothing. She flashes a look at him, and another, trying to size up this hollow figure against her memories of a wicked fighter. He looks like he's been through hell. She thought they'd gone through hell together, but it looks like he never stopped fighting. 

Running? _Forfeiter._

Misaki drives three blocks, silence thick inside the car, before she drops the burning question. “What happened to you?” 

He doesn't answer. Shoulders slack he stares out the window, so much like a Doll that a shiver runs down Misaki's spine. They need to get off the road, out of sight, and she _needs some answers_ . She has an unrestrained prisoner – criminal – in the front seat of her car, which isn't even her car it's Saitou's, and who knows how many cameras they've passed. This is so far past protocol she knows there won't be any justifying it, not unless she wants to emulate a few choice Syndicate members and stage a cover-up. _We've been grooming you_. 

“There's an alley on the right.” 

Misaki blinks despite herself. “You want me to drive down there?” 

“No. We walk from here.”

 

It must be a safehouse. Misaki pulls over, parks at a distance she hopes is enough to be a misdirect, and cuts the engine. She locks the car before leaving it, meets Li on the footpath on the far side. Whatever happened at HQ it won't be long before the hunt begins, and government cars have a way of getting found pretty fast.

A five minute walk down some very unpleasant alleys has them stopped outside the shabby back door of what used to be a kitchen. She isn't worried about the car leading to them anymore, not through this maze of garbage and cracked concrete, and watches Li negotiate the alarmed door. It'd be easier with electricity, she's sure, but there's not a lot of use in saying that.

Turns out the room is half kitchen and half diner, booths lining one wall, a bar-kitchen lining the other. It's dark, the only window boarded up. It's not what she expected for a safehouse. Li pulls the door shut behind them, throwing them into almost complete darkness. 

Misaki looses about _five years_ off her life when a shadow on one of the tables shifts, a bell jingling. 

“Ah,” says a voice, ignoring the gun that's snapped to her hand. “You brought a friend, Hei.” 

Sharp teeth gleam in the night. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thankyou to the beautiful people who left comments & kudos! This fic got a quite a bit more attention than I anticipated, lol.

Hei moves past with little regard for the standoff Misaki has created, and the tension begins to crack. She is the only one who feels threatened.

Though her gun remains on the cat – a cat who _talks_ – Misaki's eyes flick to Hei as he passes. She hadn't time, before, but now even in this dim light she can see his shoulders have the knot of a hunch. Like Dolls. Like Havoc, all of them shells. It's an awful difference but she isn't sure he would even _care_. Everything so far has been rote – kill the threat, escape the facility, go to a safehouse.

“If you're not going to use it, but that thing away,” comes a bland comment, from the _cat_ , and Misaki has so many questions about _that_ , she barely registers her own compliance. The gun slips back into its holster under her jacket, solid and comforting.

The cat has already turned away, his complete disregard on full display with a jaunty tail pointed sky-high, bell jingling as he leaps from table to counter. He walks the length of the bar a step or two behind Hei - who, for his part, does not even stop to acknowledge the creature.

It doesn't seem to affect the male one bit. “Where's Yin?”

She's never observed Hei outside of combat, in this space between civilian Li and the Reaper, and can't find any sign that he even _heard_ the question, until there comes a quiet answer. “We were separated. New body, Mao?”

It's deflection, and the twitch in the cat's tail says he can see it too. Misaki knows she's missing a piece of history here and feels the smallest bit of gratitude when Mao answers anyway, until the callous way he says it runs a shiver down her spine.

“The Syndicate thinks I'm dead.”

Misaki now knows that this is a typical contractor – almost entirely human, until it comes to the choice between life and death. She's met a lot of them – November jumps to the front of her memories, and not far behind are all the people who seemed like, well, _people_ , until their bodies lit up with synchrotron radiation. _Li_.

“Not just the Syndicate,” Hei says, and for a moment the two contractors ( _forfeiter_ ) share a look.

“I didn't expect to return,” Mao says, and she's _sure_ there's a note of apology in there. “An ally of ours fished my conscience out of the technical soup that surrounds the Gate.”

“Who?”

“It doesn't matter. The important thing is we've made contact. What are you going to do about Yin?”

Obvious though it is that this is an exclusive conversation, Misaki doesn't let that stop her from breaking in to ask the first of _hundreds_ of questions she is determined to get an answer to. “Who's Yin? Who are _you_.”

She side-steps around using the cat's name – there's no telling if they meant for her to know it, and Misaki knows better than to bring attention to those kinds of discrepancies.

Hei, again, ignores it, kneeling behind the bar to disappear from view long enough to retrieve a compact looking backpack.

It's Mao who answers, turning to face her, tucking his tail in as he sits down. “Didn't you hear what curiosity did to the cat?”

 –

 Astronomics. is. _chaos._

The building her best friend works in is a smoke stack on a computer screen, CCTV patched through to an overhead monitor typically used for Star Charts. As if that wasn't enough, with Section 4 on their asses to find the data for their _whodunnit_ , there's at least two new stars, one of which is a Moratorium, and – _and,_ the Stargazer is crooning to herself.

When it started the Observatory had all but come to a standstill, the soft noise of disapproval radiating down the microphones and echoing through the chamber. Kanami felt a moment of sympathy for the new transfer, Mina – the Gate was weird, but the Stargazer was _C_ _elestial_. The last two times the witch came to life the world almost ended, and while there aren't any prophecies being told _yet_ , both times BK201 had been involved. Misaki is too tightly involved with that Contractor for Kanami to feel anything but a building dread in the pit of her stomach.

_This can only get worse._

Leaving Mina in charge – who knew, maybe it would be useful for her upcoming paper – Kanami retreats to a corner of the room, a quiet crawling under her skin as she backtracks through the data to the moment the explosion went off.

Christ, she's glad she bought a new pack of Marlboros today; if she gets a break it's going to be spent chain-smoking.

Otsuka appears at her elbow, so suddenly and silently that Kanami flinches, hard.

“-- sorry,” Otsuka says quickly, before anything else can be said (before Kanami can curse). The young woman is stressed, they all are, but there's something in the way she grips the edges of her clipboard that has Kanami pause, turn her chair to look at her properly.

“... But I thought you should know.”

_Oh, no._

–

Misaki leans forward, letting her glasses slip down so she can pinch the bridge of her nose. She'd been running on fumes _before_ HQ got hit, and the dim room is probably the only thing keeping a migraine at bay. “I've never even _heard_ of Spectre.”

“Why would you,” Mao answers, tail sweeping the bartop in a lazy rhythm. Hei slouchs against it on the other side, his back to them. “The Syndicate was only just starting to get an idea of the size of Spectre when they collapsed. It's almost impossible to find anything about them.”

Damn that ME technology. Misaki straightens, refocuses her line of inquiry. “What do you know, then?”

“Not much,” Mao says, and if a cat could shrug, he would. “Hei?”

Misaki braces for a long pause before he answers, but surprisingly – Hei answers almost immediately. “It's where the PANDORA defectors go to play.”

She blinks. Play? This is high level science – “What's that supposed to mean?” And when Hei turns his head just enough to look at her from the corner of his eye, Misaki _kicks herself_ for saying it. Of course. _Of course_. High level science, but zero accountability – and contractors don't typically factor in under ethics.

The stamp on his dossier. _Forfeiter._

Mao's bell jingles as he sits up, then folds in on himself to scratch at his ear. “So this is where they're keeping Yin?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know _where_?”

“I can find it again.”

“I see. I would point out the _logic_ in walking away, but you've never been much of a Contractor when it comes to that.”

It's the first thing that's given Misaki real pause since arriving here – she's worked with enough contractors to know they spend half their time debating the philosophy of their own existence, and in that sense Mao's challenge isn't really anything new. It's easy to see there's a history here that she's missing, but then again … what if she's just trying to think of him as human, still?

From Hei, Mao gets no answer. His mind made up regardless of advice, the man pushes away from the counter, shrugging the backpack on. Out of the tattered clothes and in what she can only guess is old Reaper gear, the man doesn't look anything like a civilian at all, with tight shoulders and form fitting kevlar. Li slouched, wore shirts two sizes too big, and if she ever meets another man who does that – maybe she'll know better.

Misaki slides off her stool, ignoring the pinch in her thighs from tired muscles. “Li, you can't go _back_.”

“Don't call me that.”

Mao pivots in time with him, but makes little attempt to follow. “She's right, though. Yin is a strong girl, she can handle the time it takes to plan this properly. Maybe even get your powers back.”

Hei stops, one hand on the exit, and when he turns to look at them there's a lethality in his movements that makes her realise – the stories about the Reaper, before he became a Contractor.

They aren't _stories_.

“This isn't just about Yin. They have Bai as well.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp. I have a better idea of what direction I want to take this in, now, so that's something. Hopefully there's a few unforseen twists and turns for y'all, though as always I'd love to know what you think, what you're anticipating, what you enjoy. Feedback shapes stories, more than folks realise, so don't be afraid to drop a comment in. 
> 
> Coming up to another DtB marathon in a few weeks, and I'll probably try and inhale it all in two days, again. Can't be helped. 
> 
> As always you can find me on tumblr under infinitefuriosa.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A September rainshower has set in, the alley walls streaked with rain and cancelling out any intention Mao had of rushing after his companion. It's fine, in a manner of speaking – because there, a stone's throw from the door, rain is soaking into the shoulders of a suddenly, eerily still contractor.
> 
> Misaki feels herself freeze.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a lil' one to pick up the enertia again.

_They have Bai as well._

Misaki doesn't have a clue who that is or what that means, but the twist in Li's mouth is ugly and she knows that this, right here, is the only thing that is driving him to put one foot in front of the other.

She knows she's on the right track when Mao's tail goes tail stiff with surprise. “Your _sister_?”

But Li puts his back to them, and the heavy door thuds shut in answer.

“ _Hei!_ ”

“Li -”

They both rush to follow. Mao's bell jingles as he leaps from table to floor, afforded a path through the mix of furniture that Misaki can't hope to follow, though she catches up to the cat in time to heave the door open. He's quick to regain his lead, darting through as soon as the gap is wide enough and vanishing down the short hall towards the outside. Bringing up the rear – her competitive nature rebels at the thought – Misaki follows them back to the alley from an hour ago, and nearly steps on Mao before she realises he's stopped right in front of her.

A September rainshower has set in, the alley walls streaked with rain and cancelling out any intention Mao had of rushing after his companion. It's fine, in a manner of speaking – because there, a stone's throw from the door, rain is soaking into the shoulders of a suddenly, _eerily_ still contractor.

Misaki feels herself freeze.

_Doll._

She takes a few tentative steps forward, squinting through the rain as she leaves the shelter of the doorway. All her memories are alive with the time she stumbled upon him at the Temple, though she hadn't trusted her instincts enough to believe it was him at the time. She hadn't gotten close enough that time – but here, now, will he come back to life if she asks him to?

Mao makes no attempt to follow her into the wet ( _cat_ ) as Misaki carefully rounds Li's shoulder, heart so loud it feels like it's in her throat. Every instinct is screaming that there is something wrong – and his eyes are _hollow_ , like in the interrogation room, but this time they're looking straight through her.

_He is a doll he is a doll he is a doll –_

“Li?” she tries gently.

“Don't bother,” says Mao, with such candour that a bite of anger rises in her throat. He either doesn't notice or doesn't care, sitting down and tucking his tail in as he sizes up the situation from the shelter of his stoop. “He can't hear you.”

“What's wrong with him?”

“His contract.”

Misaki 's attention snaps to Mao, all her suspicions about Spectre confirmed. _Forfeiter_.

_Doll?_

… _Moratorium._

Please, no.

“It can't be helped. Come on. There is work to be done and we do not have the time to wait for Hei to come around.”

Mao's timing is perfect. He stands, arching in a stretch, and in that moment the rain begins to ease off. It isn't until it's come down to a light patter that Misaki realises how heavy it was to be standing in, and she is soaking. Li's kevlar uniform fares a bit better, but in the true fashion of a Doll there's nought in the way of complaint from him as she gently ushers him to turn around.

“No, we're done here,” Mao says. He sizes up the wet ground before them before tentatively beginning to step out onto it, a kink of disapproval in his tail. “My associate is waiting. This way.”

She knows enough of Dolls to know that Li will not follow unless he's made to. Misaki curls a careful hand around his upper arm, nudges him into motion. Leaving her to the task Mao struts past them, ears twitching as he calculates a trajectory through this labyrinth.

It's a furtive dash from one alley to the next, never straying too close to the main streets - Misaki has known this city all her life and still there are backstreets she's never seen.

Mao stops them at the mouth of an alley that feeds onto a boulevard, lit with shops and civilians. Misaki's grip tightens on Hei's arm. She has that feeling again. If they go forwards now, they'll lose him.

“Is there another way?”

Mao crouches, judging the cityscape before them. “Not one that humans can follow. We'll be fine. Walk, don't run. And whatever you do --”

Mina appears.

Hei wakes up.

Mao and Misaki experience that moment every differently.

A ripple runs through Mao's fur as he flinches when there's suddenly a whole extra human in front of him. The soft 'Mao?' does nothing to allay the reaction, the cat quick to plant his feet and scold her. “What are you -”

“Li!”

The bunch of muscle under Misaki's hand is the only warning before a _wicked_ right cross is snapping towards her. She manages to block it, catching his wrist in a 'x' created by her forearms, but there's no saving her from the left-handed undercut that goes straight to her solarplexus.

Misaki drops the guard – there's no strength in her to hold it – shoulders thunking into the wall of the alley as she tries to suck in air, bracing at the same time for whatever he throws next.

“ _Hei_!”

There isn't one.

The cat skids into the space between them. It's the ally Hei needed to see and he relaxes considerably, but Misaki doesn't miss the tension that stays in his shoulders. “Mao?”

And on one level she gets it. Contractor or not, he's highly trained, and he's woken in a potentially hostile environment – after what is most likely a _lot_ of hostile experiences.

He should have questions – how did they get here, how long was he out – Misaki, still trying to get her breath back (perhaps an apology would be nice too), sees his attention pivot to Mina, and a look of thunder crosses his face. “ _You_.”

Mina does her best not to flinch. “BK-201,” she greets quietly. It's a poor one – his mouth twists – but ever the pragmatic, Mao doesn't let them get any further than that.

“You should be at the van,” he says to her.

“... You were late,” Mina says, an edge of remorse in her tone.

Misaki straightens, dusts herself off and proceeds to cut right across the lecture. “How far do we need to go.” _Am I going to lose him again_.

Mina looks at her as though seeing the woman for the first time.

… and Misaki _knows_ , before the words are said, that it's her team.

“What is it.”

“… Chief Kirihara, there's something you need to know.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Despite my best efforts, any time I sit down to watch Darker than Black I end up inhaling the series inside of about two days. This fic is the product of a late night binge, hence the present-tense style that is honestly becoming a really bad habit at this point.  
> I have no idea where this story is going, or if it has an end, or what is going on at all, really. I guess it remains to be seen. Share your thoughts!
> 
> You can find me on tumblr under infinitefuriosa.


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